By Richard Bammer
The athletes, who are also honors or high honors students, were seniors Pattriana Perry, the second-fastest qualifier Friday in the girls 300-meter hurdles and the 100 hurdles; and twins David and Daniel Mewborn, one-half of the Bulldogs’ 4×400 relay team (with Elgin Lowell and Mykal Walker), who qualified by placing eighth. They and other Bulldogs competed late Saturday for state honors.
As the school’s symphonic orchestra played Elgar’s familiar “Pomp and Circumstance,” the Mewborns’ adoptive mother, Leslie Mewborn, characterized her sons, 18, as “shy and reserved, but they’ve always been tough guys, athletes.”
As she spoke, Santopadre, standing behind the lectern at midfield, said the graduates’ legacy would be leaving their alma mater “a better place than you found it.”